Senegal’s President Macky Sall, Tunisia’s President Kais Saied, and Japan’s Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi attend the opening session of the eighth Tokyo International Conference on African Development in Tunisia’s capital Tunis on August 27, 2022. – Japan opened the Africa investment conference seeking to counter the influence of rival China which has steadily grown its economic imprint on the continent.
In his opening speech, Tunisian President Kais Saied urged delegates to “search together for ways for African peoples to achieve the hopes and dreams of the first generation after independence”. The pledge come as China cements its influence on the continent with its “Belt and Road” infrastructure initiative, and as experts express concern about the long-term sustainability of some African nations’ borrowing from Beijing.Japan’s initiative “includes up to $1 billion in a new special quota to be established by Japan to promote debt consolidation reforms” in Africa, the Japanese premier said.
On the eve of TICAD, Morocco withdrew from the event and recalled its ambassador from Tunisia for consultations, after Saied hosted the head of Western Sahara’s Polisario secessionist movement.